If you’ve ever operated an adult pay site, you likely know the value of traffic from review sites. Frequented by savvy, discerning users who also tend to be proven purchasers, adult review sites are a tremendous source of qualified traffic.

Review sites weigh and consider a wide variety of criteria in coming up with their ratings and recommendations, among the most important being the quality of the content offered by the sites they review. But what does ‘quality’ mean in this context? What do review sites look for in assessing the value and strength of an adult site’s content?

Each review site has its own answers to such questions, of course. To get the perspective of one of the industry’s best established and most popular review sites, YNOT sat down with a rep from Rabbit’s Reviews, to find out what draws high ratings from the site’s reviewers, to serve as a guide for creators to consider when shooting content of their own.

YNOT:  As reviewers, what do you look for in content in determining whether it’s high quality? Is this mostly a ‘technical’ consideration, looking at the clarity, resolution, streaming quality and that sort of thing? How much does an understanding of the genre or niche play into the evaluation of the content’s quality?

Rabbit’s: Regarding the reviews, they are more what would be “technical” reviews in that we review the member experience. This means things like the hard stats of a site like amount of content, features like file types, Zip files and the like, along with the functionality and features that makes the membership experience rewarding beyond the content itself. Things like advanced search, filtering, favoriting, commenting and bonus material. Because we have reviewed so many sites in our history, over 15,000 that cover pretty much every legal type of porn under the sun, we apply this framework because it’s really the only thing that unites them.

We typically avoid making commentary on the quality of the content itself. We don’t presume to know what our readers will enjoy in terms of the content, so we work to discuss the content in a matter-of-fact manner and spend the majority of the review discussing how the content is delivered to the member so that our readers will know what to expect once they join. When comparisons between sites are warranted, we will make them.

Our scoring criteria is bent towards rewarding sites that provide their members with different ways for them to enjoy the content how they want to, so things like multiple resolutions, file types and sizes, as well as the ability to engage in a community. You talk to enough readers over the years and you learn that each person’s “ritual,” if you will, is different and while they will overlook certain flaws in a site if the content really scratches that itch for them they will leave sooner, or take longer to return, if certain issues, like difficulty cancelling or paying extra for downloads, persist.

YNOT: Can you offer a few examples of companies and sites that you consider models of content quality that others can look to as examples of how to do it right?

Rabbit’s: One of the best and most revealing things about having seen and reviewed so many sites over the years is that it’s next to impossible to have a model for what represents quality. The word “quality” is so subjective in the Adult sphere, not just between companies but also within the minds of the readers themselves. Some will just as easily join highly stylized sites like Blacked and Bellesa Films one month and then be in the mood with something with a bit more raunch like Hookup Hotshot or True Anal.

With that said, if you look at some of the most popular sites of all time you will find that many of them have used a simple combination of a couple of static position cameras and handycam, or sometimes just a handycam. Early Bang Bros and Naughty America come to mind, the early Reality Kings sites like the MILF Hunter, Backroom Casting Couch – the sites that broke beyond just the porn world and something approaching the mainstream.

YNOT: What are some of the common mistakes people make with their content, either in the way it is shot, presented or marketed, that you think impact a consumer’s willingness to buy?

Rabbit’s: I would say the most common mistake we have seen over the years have been the rookie mistakes that new producers/webmasters make, which is generally a combination of trying to do too many things at once with their sites or their content coupled with a lack of a specific vision for their work. They either want to reinvent the wheel in terms of content delivery or they want to be “The Netflix of Porn” and shoot all different kinds of things at once. The sites that survive those early stumbles pass through this, through feedback from their members and review sites like ours, develop their voice and in the process begin to create a community of devoted fans.

There are still many who think the days of simply recording two people having sex on camera will generate revenue for them. And to a certain point, I’m sure that’s true, but if you look at the companies that have thrived and, more importantly survived, you will see they have distinct identities. Not just in the niche(s) they shoot their content in, but also within the Adult world at large. This can be displayed in many ways, either through a specific production style or through the personality of the performer(s) or a strict adherence to only using the best examples within that niche (the hottest BBWs or the hottest feet or the best dick suckers, what have you).

Another commonality we see is the company or the webmasters behind the successful sites have a very strong attention to detail and take seriously the feedback from their members. There isn’t an element that isn’t worth investigating and improving upon. These are also the people we most enjoy working with because they are focused on providing the very best for their members and they don’t take them for granted.

Last but definitely not least is the talent themselves. Pretty much every single site that has ever reached the upper heights of visibility and popularity have been on the backs, no pun intended, of the talent that brought them there. And if you go down that list of sites you could name a handful or dozens of performers who raised their visibility and popularity through the scenes they shot with that site, in turn elevating the popularity and visibility of the site.

YNOT: If you had to give one piece of advice to someone just getting started in producing adult content for how they can develop a site that will enjoy strong retention (in a subscription model) and/or conversions, what would that advice be?

Rabbit’s: Yeah, there are many ways to answer this question as the path to success for so many producers is different. I can only speak as an outsider, but having been working with these companies for over a decade and seeing many rise, fall and in some cases rise again you see a few things.

The moment you abandon empathy for your members is the moment you begin to lose them.  The cycle we see with most porn buyers is they join a site for a month or two or three, take a break by joining another site and then come back later to catch up on the content they missed. When sites take on more and more aggressive practices with their members or don’t listen to their suggestions or concerns, the more likely they are to take longer breaks or simply not come back. We have seen it time and again. And this is not just the smaller companies, either, but companies who at one time or another were among the biggest in the industry.

One other thing I would say is create a strong identity from the start, empathize with your members and be willing to shape and evolve that identity over time based on their feedback. One of the biggest success stories of the last decade of course was Blacked.com. They were pretty much a big hit right from the start. Now, they didn’t invent interracial porn, they didn’t invent glamcore or lifestyle branding but they took all of these things along with a great initial hook (popular performers in their first interracial scenes), subtly shaped it over time and launched a giant company.

Of course, most producers don’t have the financial backing of a Vixen Media but you also don’t really need to in order to be successful. Bang Bus didn’t have a large budget, Backroom Casting Couch didn’t have a large budget. What they did have, though, were very strong identities and a hook.